


life alone makes me shake (if I die before I wake)

by sleepwithease



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: ...sometimes, Angst and Feels, Cabeswater - Freeform, Dreaming, Future Fic, M/M, Magic, Major Character Injury, Past Ronan Lynch/Adam Parrish, Romantic Fluff, Sad with a Happy Ending, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, You Know You WANT To, honestly if you can't handle my other sad fics get out this is worse, just the worst sick fic ever I guess, seriously this will be torture but lowkey read it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-06
Updated: 2018-09-20
Packaged: 2019-05-18 19:51:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14859188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepwithease/pseuds/sleepwithease
Summary: Life for Adam Parrish has done a complete 180. At 25, he is financially stable and independent, he always knows where his next meal is coming from, he works for a private law firm in D.C., he has a family in his close group of friends, a boyfriend he adores, a satyr girl who is as close to a daughter as he's likely to get and a place to call home at the end of the day. For once in his life, he has everything he could want, and yet he finds himself yearning for more.Until one phone call from the Singer Falls Emergency Center brings Adam's new life crashing down around him and reminds him that you can lose everything while you're busy searching for something more.With Ronan hanging onto his life by feeding tubes and oxygen tanks, Adam can't bring himself to believe that something as minor as a traffic accident is going to rip the love of his life away from him. But when it becomes clear that there is more going on beneath the surface, it is up to Adam to bring his dreamer back.





	1. Prologue: This Is Where It Begins

**Author's Note:**

> I'm the queen of starting new works when I haven't finished others. 
> 
> This is my Summer project, though, so it should be ~slightly~ quicker to update.
> 
> So, I'm super excited for this fic. It's going to have magic and new evil characters and SO many feels. I'm planning to alternate tense between chapters, going back and forth between snapshots of their past (for feels) and the present (for angst.)
> 
> Bear with me. 
> 
> This is going to be angsty. Buckle up, kiddos.

 

The fight starts with an unanswered question.

 

A ring, a bended knee, a gentle gasp, a silence so weighted it cannot be held between them.

 

The fight starts as it usually does with Adam and Ronan: with Adam’s stubborn pride, with Ronan’s fear of standing still in life, with their inability as a couple to communicate once from across their built-up walls and pre-drawn boundaries.

 

The fight starts with soft words that grow into harsh ones.

 

The fight starts with two men who have loved each other with the fierceness of a storm, a wildfire, a tsunami, of all the natural disasters that have shaken the Earth.

 

It starts with a man who wants just this, here. It starts with another who wants so much more…somewhere else.

 

And the truth is that it doesn’t matter how the fight starts; it matters how it ends.

 

It ends with a vase of freshly dreamed roses colliding against the wall. It ends with shouting and words so sharp they could slice clean through you. It ends with ultimatums and promises that they can’t quite keep. It ends with shallow promises not being enough.

 

It ends with a door slammed shut and a silence, thick and roaring in their ears.

 

The fight ends, and that doesn’t matter, because Adam and Ronan fight every day. And yet each time, they somehow find a way back to their forest-fire love.

 

And so it doesn’t matter that they have a fight.

 

What matters is that the last words said between the couple go like this:

 

“Maybe you should just pack your shit and go to Chicago, Parrish. Because if you don’t want to be here, then I sure as _hell_ don’t want you here.”

 

“Maybe I should.”

 

“Fucking go then.”

 

_“Fine.”_

 

And they are the last words Adam Parrish can remember saying to Ronan Lynch before the accident.

 

 


	2. Not-So-Happy Hour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam goes out for drinks and tries to forget about Ronan. He doesn't succeed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really loving writing this story! Thanks to everyone who has read so far! Leave me some comments!

 

 

“He proposed?!”

 

Adam groaned as he pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, watching as the pressure made colors swirl behind his eyelids. It did nothing to distract him from his current dilemma.

 

Jenna, his assistant and closest confidant, had her manicured hands pressed against Adam’s desk, bending over it as she stared him down with her most intimidating scowl, her perfect eyebrows arched in suspicion. Ronan referred to Jenna as Adam’s “work wife” with a surprising lack of malice in his tone. They’d been friends at Harvard and Ronan had been fond of her for years. Initially, it had made his skin itch when Adam would spend time with the beautiful femme fatale. It wasn’t until one fateful night at a frat party when Adam and Ronan stumbled into a bedroom to find Jenna straddling their Calculus TA, Allison, that Ronan tossed his fears aside and began a friendship with her. So when Adam dropped the bomb on her that he had walked out on Ronan’s intricate proposal, Jenna was not a happy camper.

 

“Are you out of your goddamn mind, Parrish?” Jenna asked. “A millionaire with a six pack, shiny blue bedroom eyes and a fucking Beemer gets down on one knee and asks you to be his trophy husband and you _decline?_ Have I taught you _nothing?_ ”

 

“You know I don’t want that, Jenna,” Adam sighed, busying himself with the task of absently shuffling around his most recent case files in order to appear too-busy to have this conversation. Jenna wasn’t buying it.

 

“Adam, baby doll, listen to me,” Jenna pleaded, perching herself on the corner of his desk. Adam rolled his eyes, tugging a folder out from underneath her ass. “Ronan worships the ground you walk on. When you say jump, he buys a fucking trampoline and goes to town. I hate to break this to you, but you’re not going to find someone better than him. Not around here, at least.”

 

“I don’t want anyone but Ronan,” Adam huffed.

 

“Then what’s the hold up, buttercup?” Jenna asked curiously.

 

Adam didn’t want to talk about this right now. He hadn’t slept a wink the previous night and just thinking about Ronan’s face, stricken with pain and confusion as Adam said no to his thoughtful proposal, lodged a lump in Adam’s throat. But Jenna was tenacious and he had nothing to do in the office to distract himself from the question at hand, so he met her eyes at last and sighed deeply, working himself up.

 

“You know I love Ronan more than anyone. Hell, more than my own life. I don’t want anyone else. Nobody has even come close to him in the past seven years and I know nobody ever will,” Adam said, getting up to stand in front of his window, looking out over the city. “It’s just that…well, we’ve always been going in separate directions, haven’t we? He wants to stay at the Barns, to raise a family and sit in his goddamn rocking chair in his old age. And sure, that sounds like a relaxing life…but I don’t want to relax. I’ve been working since I was thirteen to get where I am now. Now that I’m here, I see I can go so much higher. Why wouldn’t I want that?”

 

“Is this about Doyle’s job offer?” Jenna asked, looking crestfallen. “Are you really thinking about taking a job in Chicago?”

 

Two weeks earlier, Adam’s boss and college mentor, Justin Doyle, offered him a position at their Chicago firm. Doyle had put Adam on a pedestal, convincing him that with just a year or so of hard work, Adam could be partner. Partner, of a large city-based firm that represented some of the city’s elites. Thirteen-year-old Adam was jumping up and down at the thought of it. 25-year-old Adam said he had to think about it.

 

He’d been almost sure he wasn’t going to take it at first, but as the week went on, he couldn’t think of many reasons not to take it. The pay was nearly twice Adam’s current wages, the city was new and exciting, the position was incredible. It was an opportunity most 25-year-olds would leap at. He only had two reasons to stay where he was: a little girl with hooves for feet and Lynch-blue eyes who looked at him like he was the sun and a tattooed dreamer he had loved for so many years that the thought of life without him was nearly inconceivable. But was that enough? Could he pass up everything for life on the farm? Would he look back years from now with regret if he did? Adam wasn’t certain. So, when Ronan got on one knee and asked him the hardest question he’d ever had answer, Adam got spooked. Now, three days later, they still weren’t speaking.

 

“I don’t know,” Adam sighed. “I don’t know anything anymore.”

 

It was times like this he missed Persephone, missed the way she always seemed to know the darkest corners of his mind better than he did. He needed someone to guide him right now. He needed someone to tell him what to do. He’d usually go to Ronan, but of course that wasn’t an option now. Henry, Blue and Gansey were off on their third honeymoon since tying the knot in a small ceremony two years earlier. He’d even thought about calling Declan, even though he knew that was a dead end. That’s how desperate he was. Now here was Jenna, looking at him with the same disapproval she had shown him when Adam had briefly called it quits with Ronan at the start of their second semester in Freshman year. That look alone had been enough to make Adam realize his error in judgement and call Ronan to beg for forgiveness. Now, it wasn’t doing anything but making Adam feel shitty.

 

“Knock, knock!” called a voice from the doorway, dragging both Adam and Jenna’s attention away from the dismal conversation. Tad Carruthers stood in the doorway, smiling, completely oblivious of the tension in the room. Adam had hooked Tad up with a desk job at Doyle’s firm after they had run into each other at the 5-year Aglionby reunion. Tad had been disinherited by his father for partying too much at Duke and, truth be told, Adam had pitied him. Oh, how the tables had turned.

 

“Hi, Tad,” Adam said, shooting Jenna a look as she rolled her big green eyes so hard that even Ronan would have been impressed. “What can I do for you?”

 

“It’s happy hour down at Hannigan’s on third and Royal. I was wondering if you wanted to go grab a drink?” Tad asked, quickly amending his question with, “both of you, of course!”

 

“Actually, Adam and I-”

 

“Sure,” Adam interrupted, ignoring the daggers in the stare Jenna was shooting his way. “I could use a drink.”

 

“Great!” Tad chirped. “Jenna? You coming?”

 

Jenna sent a glare towards Adam, who simply smirked. He knew as well as she did that Jenna was not about to leave Adam alone with Tad. She liked Ronan too much to let his boyfriend have drinks alone with a guy who was still holding onto a high-school infatuation for him. Her answer was little more than a grunt. “Sure. Adam’s buying.”

 

“Sweet!” Tad said, sounding just the tiniest bit crestfallen. “Let me just pack up and we can go!”

 

When Tad disappeared from the doorway, Jenna turned back to Adam and glared. “I hope you brought your big-boy wallet, Parrish, because I’m a top shelf kind of girl and I’m feeling particularly _parched._ ”

 

Adam smirked as he tugged on his suit jacket and grabbed his briefcase, heavy with his casefiles. “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

Hannagan’s was apparently a popular spot for people Adam’s age to go drink after work. The place was packed with 20-somethings, already buzzed and relaxing after their shift or, in some instances, looking like they’d just woken up and were still partially recovering from the previous night’s bender. It’s was a Tuesday, for God’s sake. Didn’t they work.?

 

Adam had never been to Hannigan’s. In fact, he hadn’t been to a bar since Gansey and Henry’s Bachelor party, where he sat by Ronan’s side and sipped a Ginger Ale all night while everyone else got hammered. He was happy to play DD and didn’t care for alcohol, but occasionally when life handed him a rough blow, he liked a finger or two of whiskey or an occasional beer. It never really calmed his nerves, but whiskey reminded him of Ronan and that alone was enough to make Adam buy a few fingers when he used to go out in college.

 

“I’ll get us a table,” Tad said, leaping towards an empty booth. Adam and Jenna made their way towards the bar where, true to her word, Jenna ordered the most expensive Sex on the Beach ever made. Adam rolled his eyes as he paid for the offensively pink drink and two beer for Tad and himself.

 

“What’s Ronan going to say when he finds out you got drinks with your stalker?” Jenna muttered as they made their way towards Tad, who was waving them over with a giant smile on his face.

 

“Ronan made it very clear he doesn’t care what I do,” Adam said, knowing in his heart that it wasn’t true. His beer tasted bitter as it slid down his throat, or maybe it was the truth that was hard to swallow: Ronan would be hurt if he found out Adam was going to drinks with Tad instead of coming home. Of course he would. Ronan would be hurt if Adam let the bag boy at the grocery store walk him to his car at night. Adam shook off that thought as he slid into the booth. Who the fuck cared what Ronan thought? Adam was a grown man. He could go out with his work friends if he wanted to. He wasn’t even going home that night. He would be shuffling back to the hotel room he was camping out in no later than 6:15. Ronan would never know.

 

“I’m so glad we could do this,” Tad said after a long, awkward silence between the three. “I feel like all I do is work anymore. Not that that’s a problem! You know I’ll always be grateful to you for getting me this job, Parrish.”

 

“It was no problem, Tad,” Adam said, taking another sip of his watery beer.

 

“Hey, I heard Doyle asked you to switch to the Chicago branch,” Tad said. “That’s an amazing opportunity. I’m sure you’ll love Chicago. My sister lives there. She loves the city. I could set you guys up if you wanted a rundown of the area!”  


“Who said he was taking it?” Jenna asked. “Adam has a life here. A boyfriend.”

 

“Jenna,” Adam grumbled.

 

“In fact, Ronan just proposed,” Jenna smirked, watching as Tad’s face crumpled.

 

“What?” Tad said, trying to recover his smile but not quite achieving it.

 

“Jenna!” Adam hissed. “Jesus Christ. That was a secret.”

 

“Oh please, who is Tad going to tell?” Jenna chuckled, taking a long sip of her drink and nearly downing it, already half-tipsy after one drink.

 

“You’re being rude,” Adam growled, matching Jenna’s glare.

 

“And you’re being stupid. Your boyfriend is waiting at home for you. Why are you here?” She hissed. Tad sat across from them, watching the spat go down with wide eyes.

 

“Because Ronan doesn’t control me and neither do you,” Adam said through clenched teeth.

 

“Maybe we should do this another time,” Tad suggested lightly.

 

“No,” Adam grunted, upturning his beer and drinking the rest in one go. “I came out to have a few drinks and I am not leaving until I do.”

 

“But-”

 

Just then, Adam’s phone began to ring, a picture of Ronan and Opal cuddled up on the couch flashing across his screen. Jenna sent him a victorious look.

 

“Well, speak of the devil,” she smirked. “Answer it, Parrish, or I will.”

 

“Fine,” Adam huffed, pushing his way out of the booth. “I’ll be back.”

 

“We’ll be waiting!” Tad chirped, earning another colossal eye roll from Jenna.

 

Adam made his way outside, shouldering past drunks and business men alike. He sat folded himself against the outside wall of Hannigan’s and swiped his thumb across the phone’s screen, holding it to his good ear.

 

“Listen Lynch,” Adam sighed. “I’m a little busy and I’m not in the mood for a fight right now-”

 

“Adam Parrish?” A foreign voice said on the other line. Adam immediately sat up straight, checking the screen again to check that it was actually Ronan who called. When he found that it was, he pressed the phone back to his ear, his face masked with confusion.

 

“Who is this?” Adam asked.

 

“This is Jamie from Singer Falls police department. There’s been an accident.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh shit. Leave me comments!


	3. Not Fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam arrives at the hospital and discovers that life as he knows it has changed. Nothing will ever be fine again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAY FOR ANGST 
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you to everyone who has read this so far! I'm having so much fun writing it. More to come soon!

 

Panic was something that Adam Parrish was all too familiar with.

 

He had grown up with panic raging in his chest every time his father came home from a shift and cracked open his first beer of the night. Panic had settled into his heart as he watched the demon nearly unmake everything he had ever known and loved. Panic manned the control center in Adams mind all through college, waking him up in the middle of the night with attacks so violent that he’d once been hospitalized. Panic was the unwanted guest in Adam’s life that never seemed to leave. At this point, Adam considered himself well-acquainted with panic. 

 

But no panic attack, no father’s fist, no deadly demon could have prepared Adam for the feeling of arrest that clutched at his heart as Jenna drove him to the Singer Falls Emergency center.

 

“What did the officer say on the phone?” Jenna asked, all business. Her eyes were set on the road as she flew past every stop sign, around every corner. She put new meaning to “driving like a bat out of hell.” Ronan would be proud. The thought alone made Adam sick.

 

“Not much,” Adam bit out. His tone was almost calm, but his knuckles were white as they clutched the strap of his seatbelt. “There was a crash. Opal and Ronan were both in the car. They took them to the hospital. No word on their condition.”

 

“Fuck,” Jenna said. “Maybe it was just a small thing?”

 

Adam didn’t reply. The lump lodged in his throat was thick enough to choke him. He stared out the window as the hospital came into view. The last time he’d been to the hospital was when he dislocated his thumb trying to help Ronan build the new cattle fence. Ronan had been a mess, pacing the hospital room as the doctor popped the bone back into place. He hadn’t allowed Adam to lift a finger for a week. Adam would have smiled at the memory in any other situation, but now he feared if he smiled the tears would start flowing and never stop.

 

Jenna hadn’t even stopped the car before Adam was opening the door. Jenna pulled him in for a quick kiss to the cheek, whispering, “give that to Ronan for me.” Adam squeezed her hand, a silent thank you, and took off into the emergency room.

 

The waiting room was packed with people filling out paperwork, some nursing minor wounds, some sniffling softly, some speaking in argumentative whispers. Neither Opal nor Ronan was anywhere in sight.

 

“I need to see Ronan and Opal Lynch. I got a call,” Adam barked as he approached the help desk. A middle aged woman flicked her eyes towards him, sparing him only a glance before turning back to her computer.

 

“What’s your relation to Mr. Lynch, sir?” The woman asked in a monotone voice.

“I’m his boyfriend,” Adam huffed, trying not to snap as the woman gave him a long, disdainful look.

 

“Family only at this time,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

 

“What? No,” Adam said. “I am family. I’m as close to a father as that little girl has, you have to let me see them.”

 

“I don’t have to do anything, sir. Please have a seat.”

 

“We’re getting married!” Adam snapped, startling even himself. He fought off a blush as the woman cast a glance at his left hand, finding no ring. His anger flared, burning in his veins as he slammed his fist against the counter. “Dammit!”

 

“Sir, please, stay calm-”

 

“They’re the only family I have, for fuck’s sake! Don’t tell me I can’t see them and then ask me to be _calm._ ”

 

Adam pressed his hands into his eye sockets, trying to calm the anxiety raging in his heart. He forced himself to breath as colors swam behind his eyelids. He had a brief flashback to Ronan, nearly dead as the demon unmade him while Opal screamed in the passenger seat. _He’s not dead, he’s not dead, he’s not fucking dead._

 

“Parrish!”

 

Adam whipped around at the familiar voice. Declan Lynch strode into the waiting room, his eyes dark and concerned as they set themselves on Adam. But there, toddling just behind Declan was-

 

“Matty,” Adam breathed, rushing forward to catch the blonde boy who staggered forward, wrapping Adam in his arms as he choked on a breath. “Thank God.”

 

“We came as soon as we could,” Matthew said.

 

Adam was briefly relieved. If Matthew was here, standing in front of him, completely awake, that meant Ronan, his dreamer, was alive. Adam forced himself to breathe as he pressed his face into Matthew’s hair. _He’s not dead, he’s not dead, he’s not fucking dead._

“What’s going on?” Declan asked, setting a steadying hand on Adam’s shoulder.

 

“They won’t let me in to see Ronan. Apparently, I’m not family,” he hissed, sending a glare towards the receptionist, who was watching with a sour expression.

 

“Fuck that,” Declan said, flashing his I.D. at the woman. “I’m Ronan’s brother. Is there a problem here? I’m quite close to the owner of this hospital. I’ll be sure to give him a call if my brother’s lover isn’t allowed in. I’m sure he’d be quite distraught at the intolerance that shows.”

 

The woman blanched, staring between the three boys before quietly saying, “Mr. Lynch is in surgery. A doctor will be out to update you on his condition soon. The girl is somewhere on the second floor.”

 

Adam didn’t hesitate before sprinting towards the stairs.

 

“Opal!” Adam screamed as he burst out of the stairwell, startling patients sitting on side beds in the hallway. “Opal!”

 

“Sir, please keep your voice down-”

 

“Opal!” He screamed again.

 

“Adam!”

 

Adam whipped around at the sound of the familiar voice and suddenly, there she was, Opal Lynch, scratched and bruised but mostly fine as she kicked at a nurse who was trying to peel off the dream stockings that concealed her hooves. “Help!”

 

“Opal, Jesus,” Adam breathed, rushing forward to pull the whimpering girl into her arms. “Thank God. Are you okay? Are you hurt? What happened, sweetheart?”

 

“Adam,” Opal sobbed.

 

“Shhh,” Adam hushed her, pushing her messy blonde locks out of her face. “I’m here.”

 

The nurse made another go for Opal’s stockings, causing the girl to lash out one again. Adam pulled her off the little stretcher bed and put her on his hip, getting her out of the nurse’s reach.

 

“Stop,” Adam growled. “Don’t touch her.”

 

“Sir, she needs an exam,” the nurse sighed.

 

“I don’t give you permission for that,” Adam said, threading his fingers through Opal’s knotted hair as she sobbed on his shoulder.

 

“And who are you?” The nurse asked, quirking a judgmental eyebrow.

 

“I’m her fucking father,” Adam hissed. “Don’t touch her. _She’s fine_.”

 

The nurse twisted his mouth into a disapproving sneer before stomping off towards his next patient.

 

“Opal, are you okay?” Matthew asked, smoothing a hand up and down her back. Adam fought back the urge to pull her out of his grasp. He was naturally protective of Opal, even in the most common situations. Now, after thinking she was nearly dead, he would rather cut off a limb than let her out of his sight.

 

Opal continued to sniffle against his shoulder, muttering “Adam, Adam, Adam” over and over again. He pressed a comforting hand to the back of her head, trying to soothe her.

 

“Opal, darlin, where’s Kerah?” Adam asked, feeling the knot in his throat tighten once again.

 

“Gone, gone, gone,” Opal cried, twisting the knife in Adam’s heart with three little words.

 

“What?”

 

“Ronan Lynch?” A foreign voice said from behind them. All three boys whirled to see a doctor in scrubs approaching them.

 

“Is he okay?” Adam asked. “He’s going to be okay, right?”

 

“Maybe we should go sit somewhere-”

 

“I don’t want to sit down,” Adam said, trying to stay calm. “I want you to tell me my boyfriend is going to be okay.”

 

The doctor paused then, a severe, weighted silence that choked the breath out of Adam’s lungs. His vision began to blur, colors swirling in his vision as Declan asked the question Adam couldn’t quite get past his lips.

 

“Is he alive, doctor?”

 

“Yes,” the doctor sighed. “But…not by much.”  


Adam set Opal on her feet despite her desperate clinging. He felt nauseous, wobbly, light-headed at the doctor’s words. This couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be. He pinched his arm, hard, willing himself to wake up from this nightmare.

 

“We believe Ronan suffered a ruptured brain aneurysm behind the wheel, causing him to stop in the middle of an intersection. Oncoming traffic was not able to brake before the collision occurred. Thankfully, all he suffers on that front is a broken leg and a few rib fractures,” The doctor said.

 

“So he’ll pull through this, right?” Matthew sobbed, tirelessly hopeful even in the face of tragedy. The doctor winced, and that was all the confirmation Adam’s worst fears needed.

 

“Aneurysms are…tricky. Once they rupture, a patient has about 40% likelihood of living, but even then…the damage could be severe. Life altering. He could essentially become-”

 

“A vegetable,” Declan sighed. He sounded almost unaffected by it, but the silent tears dripping down his cheeks said otherwise. “So, what can we do?”

 

“Well, that’s up to Mr. Parrish,” the doctor said, casting his eyes to Adam.

 

“Me?” Adam choked out.

 

“Mr. Lynch made you his primary care advocate. We can keep him on life support, make him as comfortable and see what happens in the meantime or…”

 

“…I decide whether or not to pull the plug?” Adam said, his voice a barely-there rasp.  

 

“That’s your decision, yes.”

 

Adam gasped in a heavy breath, begging his lungs to take in air. The world swayed this way and that as he clung to the wall, trying to get a grip on anything.

 

This can’t be happening. This is a dream. _Wake up, wake up, wake the fuck up!_

“Parrish?” said a cautious voice behind him. He couldn’t tell if it was Matthew or Declan or doctor dismal. Everything sounded like he was underwater.

 

“I think I need to…”

 

But before he could even finish his sentence, his legs were buckling, giving out from underneath him. He distantly heard the doctor calling for a nurse, but it may as well have been in another country for all that Adam registered it.

 

The last thing he saw before his eyes closed was Opal, tilted sideways as she peered down at him with tears in her eyes. The last words between Ronan and him rang loud and clear in his ears.

 

_“Maybe you should just pack your shit and go to Chicago, Parrish. Because if you don’t want to be here, then I sure as hell don’t want you here.”_

_“Maybe I should.”_

_“Fucking go then.”_

_“Fine.”_

Fine. Fine, fine, fine. That word was such a sham. Adam knew, as deeply as he knew the pulsing of his own heart or the back of his hand, that nothing would ever be fine if Ronan wasn’t around. Nothing would ever be fine again.

 

And with that thought, Adam’s world went dark.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Leave me a comment if you're feeling lovely!


	4. Home Is Where You Put Roots Down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam can't see himself at the barns, so Ronan paints him a picture.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS IS MY HEADCANON RIP
> 
> (also, just as a general note, all chapters that take place in the past will be in Italics from now on)

 

_They buried Aurora Lynch on a Sunday afternoon. The sun was out, the birds were singing, Ronan still had bruises on his neck, Noah still hadn’t resurfaced and Adam stood beside the Lynch boys as they laid an empty casket into the cold ground. The world was rising from the ruins to start anew and everything felt like it was beginning again, but there was still residual pain that had to be felt, and it seemed like it was up to Ronan to feel a substantial amount of it._

_Adam watched Ronan’s pale, gaunt face as he laid a sunflower down on his mother’s casket, letting his knuckles brush against the polished wood. His eyes were blank, hollow, as they had been since he woke that morning, clinging fiercely to Adam with suspiciously wet eyes as the other boy ran his nimble fingers soothingly along his scalp. Ronan was only ever feeling in the darkness those days, where vulnerability could be hidden in shadows and tears could be wiped away before they could be seen._

_After the quiet, peaceful ceremony at Saint Agnes, everyone shuffled to their cars and drove to the barns for dinner. The Fox way ladies had put their talents together and made a meal for the small group that had pulled together to mourn the loss of Aurora. Adam sat on the couch in the barns, the replacement for the blood-soaked sofa that held memories of Aurora’s ghastly murder, and quietly picked at the strange meat-veggie-egg hybrid casserole that Maura had spooned onto his plate. Gansey and blue were cuddled together on the loveseat, inseparable since the moment Gansey had come back to life. Matthew and Declan spoke quietly in the kitchen as they helped Calla and Maura spoon food into Tupperware. Orla and Jimmy played cards on the living room floor while Opal solemnly stroked Chainsaw’s wings, both creatures as still as they had ever been._

_Ronan was nowhere to be found._

_Adam quietly excused himself from the room, tip-toeing out onto the porch where he found the dark-haired boy leaning against the porch’s railing. It seemed like years ago that he had pressed Ronan against that railing and kissed him with his whole soul; somehow, it also felt like yesterday. Time was a thing that Adam couldn’t seem to wrap his head around anymore._

_Ronan turned towards Adam as he heard the door click shut. His eyes did something complicated before returning to their blank state, gazing back out at the endless stretch of land before him. Adam came to stand next to him, not touching him but close enough that he could feel Ronan’s body heat radiating off his pale skin. He was a living furnace and Adam found himself wanting to get burned._

_It was quiet for a moment, and then Ronan spoke. “Not one for parties, Parrish?”_

_“You call this a party?” Adam asked, quirking an eyebrow in an attempt to pull a smile out of Ronan. No such luck. Ronan fell silent again and the quiet stretched between them, thick and heavy with unsaid things._

_“When is the last time you ate something?” Adam asked._

_“That’s an ironic question, coming from you.”_

_“Don’t be an asshole,” Adam huffed, too tired to be snappy._

_“I just-” Ronan said, his voice cracking. “I can’t right now, Parrish. I wish I could, but it’s-”_

_“Hey,” Adam whisper, crossing the porch to pull Ronan close. He anticipated a rejection, as Ronan wasn’t quite used to affection and often pulled away out of discomfort, but the other boy fell into him, burying his nose in his neck. “It’s okay.”_

_“Nothing is okay,” Ronan sighed. “Nothing but this. You.”_

_Adam sighed, pressing his cheek to Ronan’s, aching to be close in every possible way. He was right. The only thing holding Adam together was Ronan, strong and defiant even in his grief. Adam admired his strength. Cabeswater had only been his for a matter of months, but he felt the visceral emptiness in his core now that it was gone. Ronan had lost a mother, and that was so much more._

_“So we’ll hold onto this,” Adam said quietly, pressing a kiss to Ronan’s temple. “We’ll hold onto what we have until everything is right again.”_

_Ronan sniffled against his neck, making Adam’s heart clench. He ran a soothing hand across his back, waiting for an acknowledgement or some kind of reply. When it came, it was not at all what Adam had expected._

_“Move in with me,” Ronan whispered._

_“What?”_

_“Move in. Here. The Barns,” Ronan mumbled, finally meeting Adam’s eyes. “Come live with Opal and I.”_

_Adam’s tongue was tied in his mouth. Move in? That was huge. They’d only been seeing each other for a few weeks. Adam had an apartment of his own, one he could finally afford now that school was about to end and he had just handed in his last tuition payment. He couldn’t mooch on Ronan, not now that he could finally call himself financially stable and independent. Besides, this place wasn’t his to take. When he looked around the barns, he saw the Lynch family. Matthew, running through the fields. Declan, helping in the barn. Aurora, working in the kitchen. Niall, dreaming in the bedrooms. And Ronan…Ronan was everywhere, in every nook and cranny of that beautiful, dream-like place. There was no place for Adam at the Barns. He couldn’t find himself there. How could he live somewhere he didn’t belong?_

_“Ronan…” Adam sighed, pulling away as he searched for the right words. He didn’t need to find them; Ronan heard his answer in the weighted silence._

_“Never mind, it was stupid,” Ronan shrugged, his face shuttering as his whole body tensed. He pulled away from Adam and walked to the front door._

_“Ro, wait-”_

_“Forget I mentioned it,” Ronan said. “Seriously. It’s not a big deal.”_

_But as Ronan slammed the door behind him, the sound echoing through the sky, Adam sensed it was a very big deal. Adam thought about the blankness on Ronan’s face. The pain he was feeling. He didn’t want that turned on him. How could he fix this? How, without sacrificing another part of himself._

_Adam sat down on the porch steps, staring out at the sky, searching for comfort from Cabeswater._

_It never came._

* * *

 

_Adam had fucked it all up._

_He hadn’t seen Ronan in four days, not since they laid together in Ronan’s bed at Monmouth, nose to nose, entangled in each other but distant in a way they hadn’t been in months. Ronan’s ice blue eyes had looked into his, and underneath the blank stare there was turmoil raging within._

_“Tell me why not,” he had said, and Adam didn’t need to ask what he was talking about._

_“There’s no place for me there, Ronan,” Adam had whispered. “It isn’t my home.”_

_“Where is your home, Adam?” Ronan asked, his voice so low it could hardly be called a whisper. Adam’s heart dipped as he watched Ronan’s eyes grow sad._

_“I’ll tell you when I find it,” Adam said._

_When Adam had woken the next morning, the sheets were bare and cold beside him. Ronan was gone._

_Now here he was, days later, sitting on his bed in Saint Agnes as he stared at the cryptic text he’d received from Ronan two hours earlier._

_To: Adam_

_From: Ronan_

**come over...  have to talk 2 u**

_It wouldn’t be weird if it had come from Gansey or Blue because communication wasn’t a thorn in their sides and cellphones weren’t a foreign concept to them. But alas, it came from Ronan, who hadn’t so much as called him since Adam got his shitty track phone._

_Adam was shaking a bit as he pulled up to the barns. He didn’t want whatever it was between Ronan and him to end without ever really beginning. For once in his life he had something good, something that was his and his alone, some beautiful. He couldn’t fuck it up. Not yet._

_Opal ran outside to greet him, timidly offering him her hand to cling to, which he did, tightly and gratefully. He saw so much of Ronan in the strange girl who had invaded their lives, especially when her blue eyes turned serious as they did in that moment._

_“Do not be afraid,” she whispered, like a prophecy. Adam felt his nerves settle fractionally before twisting the doorknob and entering the house._

_Ronan was nowhere in sight but Adam could hear him in the kitchen, humming along to a little Celtic tune he had heard streaming out of his headphones the night after Aurora died and the demon was killed and Gansey came back to life. Adam had laid his head on Ronan’s breastbone, trying to remain impassive as Ronan’s chest shuddered with sobs. Now, though, his voice was just shy of cheerful. Bright. Clear. He was healing. Adam stood there for just a moment, savoring the beautiful sound of wounds patching over, before he stepped into the kitchen, Opal tugging him forward by the hand._

_Ronan turned from his place at the kitchen sink, blue eyes softening at the sight of Adam._ That’s a good sign, _Adam told himself,_ if he can still look at you like that, then all is right.

_“Hey,” Adam said nervously, trying to hide the quiver in his voice._

_“Hey, Parrish,” Ronan said. He turned his eyes towards Opal and cocked his head towards the stairs. “Go play Barbies, brat.”_

_Opal scurried off towards the stairs excitedly. Blue had brought over some of her old toys and Opal had immediately taken to the pretty, petite Barbie dolls. She liked to rip their heads off and chew on the plastic._

_As the sound of Opal’s hooves ascending the stairs echoed throughout the kitchen, Ronan and Adam locked eyes again and it struck Adam how much he didn’t want to lose whatever was between them. It was the only thing keeping him afloat and God, no one had ever looked at him like Ronan did. Like he was wanted. Like he was worshiped. Like he was special. Like he was…loved. Could that be this? Could love finally be waiting at Adam’s door after so many years? Had it finally come while he wasn’t looking?_

_“Walk with me Parrish,” Ronan said, coming around the kitchen island to take Adam’s hand and pull him towards the screen door._

_They walked in silence through the fields, the long grass brushing their shins as it swayed in the summer breeze. Ronan was leading him towards the North barn in silence, his hand tight around Adam’s own. Adam’s heart was hammering in his chest, a thousand questions running through his mind. What were they doing? Why did Ronan call him here? Would Ronan take him away from the house to break up with him to avoid Opal overhearing? Why was he_ sweating _for Christ’s sake?_

_Finally, he’d had enough._

_“Would you just do it already?” Adam huffed, pulling Ronan to a stop. The other boy look startled, blinking confusedly at Adam._

_“Huh?”_

_“Just do it. I’d rather just get it over with, if you don’t mind,” Adam snapped, trying to fight off the lump that was quickly rising in his throat._

_“What are you talking about?” Ronan asked, his dark eyebrows furrowed with frustration._

_“Break up with me! God, you didn’t have to drag me all the way out here. I wouldn’t have caused a scene,” Adam snapped._

_“Parrish-”_

_“Not that there’s anything to really break up, I guess. We never really put a name on this, really.”_

_“Hey-”_

_“If this is because I said no to you asking me to move in then that’s really shitty and-”_

_“Adam!” Ronan exclaimed, grabbing hold of Adam’s shoulders and shaking him into silence. “Shut the fuck up and follow me.”_

_And so he did._

_Ronan pulled them to a stop outside what appeared to be a little house made entirely of not-quite-clear windows, with panes painted mint green and a white door. Through the blurred grass, he could color, so much color, reds and blues and yellows everywhere. Above the door there was a sign painted in neat cursive that resembled Ronan’s strangely perfect handwriting. It read: **Parrish’s Place.** _

_“What is this?” Adam asked._

_“Why don’t you go find out?” Ronan suggested._

_Adam hesitantly made his way towards the little shack and placed his hand on the doorknob. He thought he felt something, just for a moment; a familiar throb, a pulse, a remnant of the forest he hadn’t felt in weeks. It gave him the courage to open the door._

_“_ Ronan, _” Adam gasped as he saw what the little house held._

_Flowers. Hundreds of different kinds of flowers and plants and ferns and cacti and small, ornate trees. There were rows of clay pots lining the shelves that ran along the walls. In the corner there was a small sink and a hanging station that held shovels, watering cans, gloves and clippers. There was a box of different seeds on top of a work desk, as well as a hanging light that illuminated the space. On the wall, there was another sign, one of those cheesy, hallmark quotes that people have embroidered on pillows or turning into car decals._

_Home Is Where You Put Down Roots_

_Of all the things that rendered Adam speechless about this, it might have been that pun._

_“Do you like it?” Ronan asked nervously from the doorway, his hand anxiously scratching at the back of his neck. “I said that sign was fucking stupid but Gansey wouldn’t let me leave without it.”_

_“I…what…why?” was Adam’s very clear, very concise answer._

_Ronan hesitantly came towards Adam, like someone would approach a frightened animal, and pulled then chest-to-chest. Adam met Ronan’s eyes and in them was a surety the likes of which Adam had never seen in Ronan, hadn’t seen in himself._

_“You said there wasn’t a place for you here,” Ronan said, “so I built you one.”_

_“You…” Adam whispered, looking around at the greenhouse. “You built this? With your_ hands? _”_

_“That’s generally how you do it,” Ronan smirked. “I spent the last few days doing it. Gansey and Blue helped. The brat even aided in the planting process.”_

_Ronan’s smile faded a bit as he studied Adam’s face, which was pale and shocked as he looked around. Ronan rushed to explain himself. “I just-…you lost something too that day. And I’m going to try to build you another Cabeswater, but until I do…I thought this could suffice.”_

_Adam stared up at him, dumbfounded by this act of care that months ago he wouldn’t have thought Ronan capable of. But he had always underestimated Ronan, hadn’t he? He’d always chosen to see the dark, angry boy at the surface instead of the gentle, caring man at the core. But here, now, he was seeing Ronan in a different light._

_“Ronan, I don’t know what to say,” Adam whispered. “This is the most beautiful thing anyone has ever done for me.”_

_Ronan smiled then, the gentle one he saved specifically for Matthew and his dream things and Adam, and pressed his forehead against Adam’s. “Say you’ll move in with me.”_

_And this time, Adam didn’t even hesitate._

_“Okay.”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave me some comments, please!! Thanks for reading!


	5. So Cold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam sees Ronan for the first time since the accident.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...so here's the deal. 
> 
> My writers block is off the charts. It's never been this bad. I had to step away from this fic for SO LONG because my brain is just unwilling to cooperate. It's getting better now that I'm in school, though. My itch to write is coming back...slowly. 
> 
> Please stay with me and be patient. I want to make this awesome. I don't want to give you half-assed content. That only works if I don't rush it. 
> 
> I'll be updating more, but they will be shorter chapters and there will be more of them. That means more flashbacks, more updates, better content, LESS WAITING. 
> 
> Thanks to all who left me sweet comments. They push me forward. 
> 
> Okay, enough talking. Here's some heartache. Enjoy!

 

 

On Friday morning, Ronan was moved from intensive care to the recovery wing after four consecutive surgeries tore apart his body in order to make it whole again.

 

Adam had been sitting in the same chair for two days straight, Opal in his lap and a Lynch brother on either side of him. Declan and Matthew had gone back to the barns every evening for rest and recuperation, tugging a begrudging Opal behind them as they promised vehemently that they would take her back first thing in the morning. Adam, on the other hand, had hardly moved at all, getting up only for a vending machine run or a trip to the bathroom. Ronan hadn’t been allowed visitors of any kind, not while his body was battling to heal itself, but Adam didn’t want to risk not being there when the doctor gave the OK for visitation. His skin stung with the absence of Ronan’s touch. He hadn’t slept in days, hadn’t eaten more than a couple of stale poptarts, hadn’t even bathed and yet all he could do was think of Ronan, yearn for his touch, for his voice in Adam’s ear, for his heartbeat to be beating underneath the pads of Adam’s fingers, a sliver of the hope that Adam was desperate to find within these fluorescently lit halls. He needed a sign that it was all going to be okay. He needed confirmation that Ronan was still with him.

 

On Friday Morning, he got one.

 

“Adam?”

 

Adam jumped slightly at the sound of his name echoing off the tile. The waiting room was virtually empty, containing only him, a young couple whose heads were bent against the top of their chairs in mutual unconsciousness and a middle aged receptionist who was flipping through a stained magazine and smacking her gum. Opal, Matthew and Declan were still at the barns, most likely sleeping as the sun had not yet risen. It was what Ronan would call “ass o’clock in the morning” and Adam was wide awake.

 

Ronan’s main doctor, Dr. Bishop, was standing in the doorway of the waiting room, looking exhausted and frail in the fluorescent light. He came to sit next to Adam, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. Adam felt his body seize up. He didn’t want to be comforted. He didn’t want bad news. He didn’t want to hear that Ronan was-

 

“He’s ready for a visitor,” Dr. Bishop said. “Would you like me to take up back?”

 

Adam felt almost disconnected from himself, the exhaustion in his bones wreaking havoc on his mind and body, but he recognized himself nodding, recognized the familiar motions of stand and walking, the sound of footfalls on the linoleum as Dr. Bishop led him down the hallway. It was like he was standing outside of reality, watching someone else drift down the hallway behind Dr. Bishop.

 

But reality came crashing down upon him like ice cold water, sending a jolt through his veins and straight to his heart, as they stopped at the last door on the right and Dr. Bishop opened the door.

 

Adam had always loved watching Ronan as he slept. It seemed it was the only time his adrenaline junkie, hard wired, sharp smiling boy was at peace. He couldn’t count the number of nights he had spent staring at the sleeping boy, a hint of a dream making his blue eyes dance beneath their lids, his slow breaths making his chest rise and fall in even time. Sometimes, Adam would place a hand on his chest, feeling the tide-like push and pull of his lover’s lungs, thinking about how beautiful Ronan was in his sleeping form. How ethereal. How calm.

 

The scene before Adam was nothing like that. Nothing at all.

 

With a gasp lodged in his thickening throat, Adam stepped hesitantly towards the hospital bed where the shell of the man he loved lay, scarcely breathing and too fucking still. A heart monitor beeped in the corner of the room, the harsh sound of it rivaled only by the loud compressions of Ronan’s breathing machine. There were so many goddamn wires and tubes, far too many to track where they connected to the boy laying half-dead in the bed. Ronan’s eyes were purple from bruising, his perfect cupid’s bow split all the way across, his arms gashed and stitched from wrist to shoulder. Adam had been waiting to see Ronan for days, anxiously anticipating the moment his hand found Ronan’s again. But this body in the bed, the one dangling from life by a thread, this wasn’t what he had imagined. This wasn’t Ronan. Not Adam’s Ronan, anyway.

 

Adam stepped forward slowly, his hands naturally gravitating towards Ronan but hovering just above the surface of his skin. For the first time in his life, Adam wasn’t quite sure how to touch Ronan. A knot set thick and heavy in his stomach as his fingers lightly brushed the few patches of unmarred skin on his wrist and found their way to his limp hands.

 

Adam knew, perhaps better than anybody, that Ronan Lynch was a human furnace. Adam couldn’t count the times he woke sweating in his bed, the body heat radiating off of Ronan making it too uncomfortable to sleep. In the Winter, Adam loved to come in from the cold and find Ronan on the couch, his arms outstretched and inviting. Adam would crawl into those warm arms, press his nose into the soft skin of Ronan’s neck, intertwine his fingers with Ronan’s.

 

“Jesus,” Ronan would hiss playfully, a handsome grin pressed into Adam’s hair. “So cold, Parrish.”

 

“Then warm me up, Lynch,” Adam would say and they’d lay there, breathing in perfect harmony, until they fell asleep.

 

Adam felt his breath hitch as his hand’s found Ronan’s. They were bruised, swollen, and cold as ice.  The tears came without warning.

 

“So cold, Lynch,” Adam whispered, pulling Ronan’s hands up to his chin, leaving gentle yet desperate kisses along the purple skin. He wanted to badly to pull him into his arms, hear his voice, feel the warmth and life flood back into him. But he couldn’t All he could do was sit at his side and watch as the breathing machine made his chest rise and fall, rise and fall.

 

“We don’t know how long he’ll be under,” Doctor Bishop said, making his presence known for the first time since they entered. “He’s…stable. That’s all we can hope for.”

 

“Can he hear me?” Adam asked, stroking a gentle thumb across Ronan’s palm. He hoped Ronan could feel it. He hoped that beneath the marred skin and closed eyes, Ronan was there, feeling and hearing and fighting his way out of this. He hoped that Ronan knew he was there. He needed him to know.

 

“Some scientists say that humans in comas can comprehend their surroundings, even in sleep,” Doctor Bishop said. “Talk to him, Adam. They fight harder when they know they have something to come back to.”

 

Adam was quiet as he took that information in, his eyes roaming Ronan’s nearly lifeless body. Then, almost in a whisper, he asked, “is that all doctor?”

 

It was a silent dismissal and Doctor Bishop knew it. He put his hands in the pocket of his lab coat and shrugged, giving Adam an encouraging smile. “That’s all there is,” he said. “I’ll leave you to it.”

 

Adam barely heard the door swing shut, hardly recognized time passing as he sat there, wondering what to say. The truth was that Adam had spent the last two days in the waiting room, his mind restlessly pouring over all the things he wanted to say to Ronan and yet here he was, silent. Nothing was good enough. Nothing he could say would save Ronan.

 

And so Adam said the only words that came to mind.

 

“I love you,” he whispered over the beeping of the heart monitor, the sound of the breathing machine, the echoing silence that took the place of Ronan’s voice. He squeezed Ronan’s hand, feeling the faint pulse there, his heart grasping that the thin shreds of hope that came with every thump. He leaned over Ronan’s body carefully, careful not to disturb the tubes, and placed a kiss on the corner of Ronan’s mouth. If this were a fairytale, Adam would have the power to wake Ronan with that kiss. If this were a fairytale, Ronan would open his eyes and smile up at Adam. If this were a fairytale, Adam wouldn’t be in a hospital, clinging onto Ronan as he silently slipped away from him. But this wasn’t a fairytale and in their story, nothing was ever that easy. So they’d do what had to be done, as they always did, and they’d fight their way through this, as they always did. Because if it was as easy as a fairytale, it wouldn’t be Adam and Ronan.  

 

“Come back to me.” Adam whispered, the words spoken just into Ronan’s ear. And somewhere, deep beneath the surface, Ronan heard.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave me a kind comment if you feel so inclined! They make me want to write for you. <3


	6. Watch Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adam returns to the Barns for the first time since the accident.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAY ANOTHER UPDATE! We're getting there. 
> 
> Please forgive me if this has hella mistakes. I wrote this super fast and I'm barely awake, honestly. Leave me some comments if you're feeling lovely! The comments and outpouring of love on my last chapter really made me want to write, so thank you for that!
> 
> Enjoy!

Gansey arrived at the hospital first thing Sunday morning.

 

Adam was sat next to Ronan when he blew into the hospital room, hair unkempt, eyes wild and bloodshot. He spotted Adam first and Ronan shortly after and Adam could hear the change in his breathing when his gaze shifted, when he saw the shell of what was once his very best friend, his brother.

 

“Fuck,” Gansey croaked, and somehow it sounded so elegant, so Gansey, that it broke Adam’s heart all over again.

 

Gansey’s gaze shifted back to Adam and suddenly Adam’s body was relaxing, grateful in the knowledge that his best friend, his king, had finally arrived to take some burden from his back. It made everything so much more bearable.

 

“I’m sorry, Adam,” Gansey whispered, pulling Adam into his arms. “I’m sorry I’m so late.”

 

“Gansey,” Adam shuttered a breath, his nose digging into the juncture between Gansey’s shoulder and neck. It would have been an almost awkward position with anyone else since Adam had refused to take his hand out of Ronan’s, but Gansey just squeezed him tighter with one arm and Added his hand to the mix- the three musketeers together again.

 

“Getting a flight out of Tibet was absolute torture,” Gansey sighed. “I tried to be here, I-”

 

“It’s okay, Gansey,” Adam said. “You’re here now.”

 

“Yeah,” Gansey croaked, pulling back from the embrace at last. He put his hand on Adam’s cheek, tracing the dark crescents beneath his eyes. “You look exhausted.”

 

“I am,” Adam agreed, ducking bashfully away from Gansey’s dissecting gaze. “I couldn’t leave him.”

 

Gansey made a noise of acknowledgement before sitting carefully on the edge of Ronan’s bed. Adam was tempted to panic, to pull Gansey away from Ronan’s tubes and wires, away from the things that were tethering his lover to this earth, but he didn’t. Adam simply watched as Gansey ran a finger up and down Ronan’s forearm, something Adam had been watching him do to soothe Ronan since they were children. The sight made a lump rise in Adam’s throat.

 

“Oh Ronan,” Gansey sighed shakily.

 

Adam cleared his throat, trying to drain the tension from the room, from his own chest. “Where is-”

 

“Here!” Blue’s voice came from around the corner and it was in moments like this that it was hard for Adam to believe Blue wasn’t a psychic. “We’re right-”

 

And then she rounded the corner, Henry on her tail, both of them coming to a halting stop in the doorway.

 

“Here,” Henry finished her sentence.

 

Adam let them both have their moment of shocking grief because God knows he’d had so many of those moments over the past few days. He watched as they approached Ronan’s bedside, crouching beside him, a court in vigil. Blue took his hand in his, squeezing it tightly.

 

“You asshole,” she hissed through her teeth. “Where have you gone?”

 

“Adam,” Gansey said, speaking for the first time since his spouses arrived. “I’m worried about you.”

 

“Me?” Adam was a bit thrown, he wasn’t going to lie. If anyone in this room deserved Gansey’s worry, it was Ronan.

 

“You look like you haven’t slept in a week, Adam,” Blue murmured.

 

“Yeah, I’d love to take a crack at those bags under your eyes with my concealer,” Henry mused, his humor unfailing even in dire moments.

 

“Adam,” Gansey said, taking his hand. Adam met his unflinching hazel eyes. “Will you let us take care of him while you go home for some rest?”

 

“I don’t know,” Adam sighed, looking back to Ronan. He let his thumb find a patch just above Ronan’s eyebrow, nearly the only part of his face unmarred. “How can I leave him?

 

“Adam,” Henry said, sober for a fleeting moment as he took Adam’s hand. “He will be here when you get back.”

 

“I can’t be sure of that, can I?” Adam croaked. “I’m not sure of anything anymore.”

 

“You’re no good to Ronan if your exhausted,” Blue said, ever sensible. “We will call you with any changes. Go home. Eat. Rest. Shower.”

 

“Yeah, dude, I didn’t wanna be the one to tell you this but you _stink_ ,” Henry said, wrinkling his nose. “Like, I’m surprised your stench hasn’t roused Ronan yet, honestly.”

 

Gansey and Blue looked at their husband with matching warning glares but the joke startled a laugh out of Adam. It nearly got lodged in his throat. It felt like it had been years since he had last laughed. In that moment, he was so grateful for his three best friend, for being here, for reminding him how to be human.

 

“Okay,” Adam sighed. “You’ll call?”

 

“Absolutely,” Gansey said.

 

“Go,” Blue ordered.

 

Adam swallowed back the riot that was building in his throat. He felt itchy as he gathered his things and made his way to Ronan’s beside _. Leaving for the first time will be the hardest part of this,_ Adam told himself, only half believing.

 

Adam leaned over Ronan, pressing a gentle kiss to the corner of Ronan’s mouth. “I’ll be back soon, baby,” Adam whispered. And then, forcing himself not to look back, he was gone.

 

He called Declan and Matthew on the way out of the hospital. They had taken Opal with them to church. It had seemed strange to Adam that they would go even now, even without Ronan, but he understood. They all had so much to pray for.

 

He spoke to Opal for a moment and then Declan informed him that they’d be bound for the hospital after church so Adam would have the house to himself. That scared Adam. Without someone else to be strong for, how would he keep himself together?

 

He’d find out soon enough, he guessed. He slid into Matthew’s car, breathed in the smell of leather, such a relief from the stench of antiseptic that it stung his nostrils, and put the car in drive. Then, with his eyes on the rising sun, he set off towards home.

 

* * *

 

 

Adam had always suspected that Ronan Lynch had dreamt the sky at the barns.

 

But no, that’s not quite true. At first, he thought Niall had dreamt the sky. It was vast and complicated, a trifle of clouds and going light, and it was hard for Adam to believe Ronan could have made something so vast. But Niall wasn’t a dreamer of light. He was a dreamer of tricks, of magic, of slights of hand. Ronan dreamt of light. Ronan dreamt of beauty. Only Ronan could have pulled that beautiful sky back into the world. Only he could have made that light.

 

As Adam drove up the drive to the Barns, this thought was cemented in his mind. Because the sky wasn’t bright and beautiful. It wasn’t its usual mix of oranges and pinks and blues. It wasn’t dreamlike.

 

It was raining. Storming, more like it. Lighting cracked across the horizon with angry aggression.

 

The sky cried out with thunder as he parked beneath the willow tree, protecting Matthew’s car from the storm. He ran up the cobblestone walk, dodging Opal’s toys, Ronan’s shoes, relics of a time that seems so far away now.

 

She was there, waiting for him on the windowsill by the front door. Chainsaw squawked at him, calling his name and flies to his shoulder. His heart unfurled as she nuzzled his cheek. She was as close to family as Opal was, as much of a daughter to his heart. He took out his key, scratched from years of use, from years of coming back home, and unlocks the door.

 

It was so strange to walk through that house without Ronan. It was dark and dull in the grey atmosphere, illuminating every so often with the electric white light of the lightning. He knew that Ronan was alive, knew he was back at the hospital, asleep but still there, under the surface. So why did the place feel like a graveyard? Why did he get the feeling he was walking through a place long abandoned, haunted by not two Lynches but _three?_ The thought made Adam shiver.

 

Declan had taken the time to clean the house, making the place so clean it was hardly recognizable. Adam ate two stale bread rolls over the sink, ravenous, washing it down with a splash of milk. He took a hot shower, scourging his skin of the smell of rubbing alcohol and body odor. He let the heat of the shower do its work on his muscles, loosening them, unwinding the knots that had set there. He felt instantly better when he stepped out of the steam and into his bedroom, but as he crawled into his bed, left cold and vacant, he felt the absence of Ronan like a dagger in his side. He pressed his nose to Ronan’s pillow, pulling it into his arms, holding it so tightly that if he closed his eyes really tight, he could tell himself it was Ronan he was holding, Ronan whose scent was lulling him to sleep.

 

He woke hours later at the sound of cracking thunder, grouchy and sleep-warm. He wandered down the stairs in search of more food but stumbled upon Chainsaw, pecking at the glass of the back door. 

 

“Okay, okay,” he huffed. “I’m coming, stubborn bird.”

 

Adam opened the door for her and watched as she flew through the rain, soaring into one of the gaping windows of the greenhouse. He should close that before animals got in, animals who didn’t come from Ronan’s head, ones that wouldn’t think twice about eating his snap peas.

 

Adam pulled a pair of Ronan’s old gumboots over his thick socks, over the ankles of his sweatpants. He pulled on an old red raincoat, tugging the hood over his head, and set off towards the greenhouse.

 

Adam felt the breath leave him as he opened the door to his sanctuary. His eyes burned as he looked around. How could this be? How, when he’d only been gone a little more than a week?

 

Every plant Ronan had dreamt for him, every cactus, every bonsai tree and flower was dead, wilting and shriveling into nothing right in front of his eyes. The place smelled of rot, a scent that made what little food was in Adam’s stomach rile with unrest. He could see where animals had come to eat off the rotten plants, but they didn’t get far with their spoils. On the floor, squirrels and birds and mice were lying dead, poisoned by the plants. What the fuck was going on?

 

Adam let his eyes travel up to the sign hanging tauntingly on the wall. _Home is where you put down roots._ The phrase was mocking him. He’d always thought of the Barns as home, ever since Ronan had surprised him with the greenhouse. But he realized now, with unshaken certainty, home wasn’t here, not in this place of rot and death. Home wasn’t the barns, eerie in its silence, a resting place for ghosts. Home wasn’t an empty bed, cold and unmade, left suddenly abandoned. Home wasn’t this place at all, he knew that now.

 

Home was lying in a hospital bed, breathing only because a tube was helping him do so, eyes closed, dead to the waking world. Home was bruised and broken and mangled from trauma. Home was a shell of a boy, suddenly cold and unmoving.

 

Home was Ronan. Home would always be Ronan. How could he have ever thought otherwise?

 

And then Adam was struck still with a sickening thought. What if Ronan didn’t make it? What if the world ripped Adam’s home away from him in one go, taking Opal, taking chainsaw, taking Ronan from him all at once?

 

Adam bent over and vomited all over the floor, choking up the two stale rolls of bread and a week of bile that had been sitting in the pit of his stomach, barely staying put. He didn’t realize he was crying until the harsh sobs began to shake him, his breath harsh and shallow. He picked up a potted flower and chucked it at the wall, delighting in the sound of the impact, reveling in the sound of the shatter. For the first time since the accident, Adam let himself break down.

 

He fell to his knees, sinking into the earth, screaming over the sound of thunder. He was angry. He was so _fucking_ angry. How _dare_ God try to take his home away? How dare he, after everything he’d put them through?

 

Adam glared up at the sky, his teeth bared in disgust. “You’ve taken too much,” he called out to a God he didn’t believe in. “You can’t have them. You can’t have my family!”  


The sky bellowed with thunder once again. It sounded like God answering. It sounded like him saying _, “watch me.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave me a comment if you feel so inclined!

**Author's Note:**

> Leave me comments and follow me on tumblr! @sleepwithease


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